Anthony and Joe Russo have revealed the unexpectedly casual moment Robert Downey Jr. landed on his voice for Doctor Doom, saying the discovery instantly became one of the most memorable moments of their work together on Avengers: Doomsday.
Speaking to PEOPLE at San Diego Comic-Con following Marvel’s Hall H presentation, the directing duo said they’d already been confident Downey was right for the villain role well before hearing his take on the character.
“That was something that Robert surprised us with one day,” Anthony Russo recalled.
“You know, we were talking about all the details of the character, the voice, of course, is a key part of it, especially in the mask. So one day I think it was in the trailer, we were just sort of talking about some ideas and he broke out into the voice. And we knew at that moment, that was it.”
Joe Russo said the moment left him with “chills,” comparing its impact to another of Downey’s defining MCU moments: “It’d probably be one of the more memorable moments, that and the ‘I Am Iron Man’ [scene] when he snapped his fingers. Robert tends to present a lot of those super memorable moments.”
Downey’s Doctor Doom voice, which leans into a heavy fictional Latverian accent, drew mixed reactions online when it was first previewed in trailer footage, with some comparing it to a theatrical Dracula impression.
The Russos’ account of the instance suggests the choice was a considered one, shaped by detailed conversations between the actor and directors about the character’s psychology and the weight of fan expectation, rather than a late addition to the performance.
Downey returns to the MCU in Avengers: Doomsday not as Tony Stark but as Victor Von Doom, the film’s central antagonist, in a story that brings together the Avengers, the Fantastic Four and the X-Men for the first time.
Avengers: Doomsday, directed by the Russo brothers, opens in theatres 18 December.
